After Iraq bombing, UN wants 778 new security jobs

UNITED NATIONS - The United Nations proposed on Monday a major $97 million overhaul of its security system with 778 new posts, a response to devastating safety reports after the 2003 bombing of its offices in Iraq. In a report to the General Assembly, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the world body needed a new directorate of security, based in New York, to unify its myriad safety structures around the world. “A degree of risk cannot be avoided,” he said. “The challenge is to mitigate it.” The report did not give figures but U.N. sources said Annan, and his deputy, Louise Frechette, wanted to add 778 positions, including 33 in places where there are no security staff. Some 99 posts would be in New York. The cost of the new jobs as well as needed equipment would be $97 million. The current number of security staff was not immediately available. Such staff is decentralized among agencies, programs and various U.N. offices. A year ago, a panel headed by former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, accused the United Nations of a catalogue of security breaches that it said probably cost lives in the Aug. 19 bombing of U.N. headquarters in Baghdad. That report blamed security officials and top management in New York and in Iraq for lapses before the August 19, 2003 attacks in Baghdad that killed 22 people and injured 150. It called the security arrangements “dysfunctional” and “sloppy.” One problem was that no one was in overall charge. The report proposed a new unit at U.N. headquarters, headed by an undersecretary-general and including a “threat and risk analysis” section. This directorate would have responsibility for security for 100,000 U.N. staff and 300,000 dependents worldwide, including those from specialized relief agencies, at more than 150 duty stations. A considerable number of these are considered high risk, the report said. In each country, one security officer would be in charge. In countries, with peacekeeping missions, security would have to be coordinated with commanders and the New York peacekeeping department the report said. In case of a dispute, Annan would intervene. The report is being transmitted to General Assembly budget and management committees, which must rule on the proposals and will probably trim some of the costs, diplomats said. “It’s not going to be an easy ride,” said one envoy, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Annan, whose trips abroad are secret until the last minute, cautioned that the United Nations could not succumb to a “bunker mentality” and shrink from work it was expected to do. But he said “recent events have brought the United Nations face to face with the danger that the organization itself may have become a primary target of political violence.” “Further attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan remain possible and there is a distinct possibility of direct and deliberate targeting of United Nations personnel and facilities in other locations as well,” he said in the report.

 

Turkish politician jailed for calling premier 'infidel'

ANKARA — A Turkish politician gets eight months in jail for calling PM 'infidel'. Nationalist Turkish politician Cem Uzan, the scion of a business family accused of massive fraud, was sentenced to eight months in jail yesterday for insulting Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Anatolia news agency reported. "You are a treacherous man. What sort of Muslim are you? You have become an infidel," Uzan said at the rally in Bursa. The ruling by a court in the northwestern city of Bursa concerned a speech Uzan, leader of the small Youth Party, made there in June 2003 in which he called Erdogan "treacherous" and an "infidel." Uzan was also fined some $466, Anatolia said. The politician's diatribe against Erdogan followed a government decision to seize control of two power utilities operated by the Uzans. 

Pitcairn sex crime defendants wins right to appeal whole trial process

WELLINGTON, New Zealand - Lawyers defending seven Pitcairn Islands men against a string of sex charges have been granted the right to challenge the trial process before Britain’s highest appellate court, British authorities said on Tuesday. A spokesman for Richard Fell, the British High Commissioner in the New Zealand capital of Wellington, who is also governor of Pitcairn, confirmed the Privy Council decision but said authorities still were trying to clarify its “full implications.” “It is unknown what the extent of the appeal might be and how it will affect the trials and their outcomes,” spokesman Bryan Nicolson told The Associated Press. Earlier, in an e-mail message sent to the AP, an islander attending the trials said the Privy Council had granted the defense a chance to challenge the validity and legality of Britain’s jurisdiction over the islands. The hearing “will begin sometime mid-next year,” the islander said. Previous appeals by defense lawyers against Britain’s jurisdiction over its last remaining territory in the Pacific have been rejected. Australia’s Sky TV also reported the development, saying the London-based Privy Council had granted an application by the men’s defense lawyers to appeal against British jurisdiction over the islands. Sky said lawyers argue that Pitcairn islanders arrived on the island in the 18^th century as pirates after their mutiny on the British ship Bounty and therefore renounced all claims to British citizenship. Sky reported that the trials will continue, but the Privy Council ruling opens the way for any convictions to be quashed. Media on the island reported that the current trials, which involve 55 charges of rape, and sexual assaults, were proceeding as scheduled. The cases against several defendants, including the island’s mayor, have been heard over the past two weeks, but no judgments have been issued. Two islanders have pleaded guilty to sex abuse but have not been sentenced. The trials follow investigations by British and New Zealand police into allegations island men have sex with underage girls, in one case a child of three years. One alleged victim, testifying by videolink to two courts set up in Pitcairn’s community hall, said men on the island, which has a population of just 47, treated girls and young women like a “harem